The Achievable Dream: College Board Lessons on Creating Great Schools, by Gaston Caperton and Richard Whitmire (College Board). Based on Caperton’s personal observations as the president of the College Board and a former governor, these stories offer specific lessons of education successes. The vignettes feature students, parents, educators, policymakers, and communities and focus on the idea that improving education in the United States requires a shared commitment to learning.
A Commonsense Approach to Educational Leadership, by Robert Palestini (Rowman & Littlefield Education). Identifies 10 role models and analyzes their leadership behavior to identify the abilities and skills that helped them succeed.
The 12 Laws of Urban School Leadership: A Principal’s Guide for Initiating Effective Change, by Sean Yisrael (Rowman & Littlefield Education). Provides strategies to implement change and achieve reforms to aspiring, novice, and veteran school principals in urban areas.
Leading For Democracy: A Case-Based Approach to Principal Preparation, by Patrick M. Jenlink, Lee Stewart, and Sandra Stewart (Rowman & Littlefield Education). Emphasizes case-based pedagogy for principal preparation and the democratic ideals that provide the foundation for democratic schools.
Leading for Powerful Learning: A Guide for Instructional Leaders, by Angela Breidenstein, Kevin Fahey, Carl Glickman, and Frances Hensley (Teachers College Press). Combines theory with best practices and identifies specific structures, formats, and strategies that instructional leaders can use to support 21st century principals and teacher-leaders.
Transformational Leadership in Special Education: Leading the IEP Team, by Kirby Lentz (Rowman & Littlefield Education). Provides a background of meaningful and purposeful individualized education program leadership.
The Way of Oz: A Guide to Wisdom, Heart, and Courage, by Robert V. Smith, with illustrations by Dusty Higgins (Texas Tech University Press). Written by a veteran educator, this book uses the virtues of each of the archetypes contained in the Wizard of Oz stories—the Scarecrow, the Tin Woodman, the Cowardly Lion, Dorothy, and the Wizard—to guide readers to a deeper understanding of lifelong learning, loving, serving, and leading.
What Every Principal Needs to Know to Create Equitable and Excellent Schools, edited by George Theoharis and Jeffrey S. Brooks (Teachers College Press). Content experts in literacy, mathematics, science, social studies, music, early childhood, special education, English-language learners, world languages, and physical education offer advice to new and veteran principals on how to ground a commitment to social justice and equity in core subjects.
Yes to the Mess: Surprising Leadership Lessons from Jazz, Frank J. Barrett (Harvard Business Review Press). This book looks at what the skills of great jazz musicians, such as Duke Ellington and Miles Davis, can teach about leadership. The author, a jazz pianist and management scholar, explores how an improvisational “jazz mind-set” and the skills that go along with it can be used for effective leadership today.